


Miklan and Felix Do Sreng

by Sunnybone



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Medical Experimentation, Miklan POV, Miklan is shit but he's trying not to be AS shit, Miklan redemption arc? in MY AU? it's more likely than you think, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-19
Updated: 2020-02-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:40:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22799455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunnybone/pseuds/Sunnybone
Summary: Miklan meets with a buyer to deliver cargo on a smuggling job, only to find himself reluctantly 'employed' (read: forced at the end of a blade) by one Felix Hugo Fraldarius to help track down his missing brother, Sylvain—who, if you can believe it, is not up someone's skirt, but being held by some shady organization (with a really *stupid* name) who are probably after his oh-so-special-and-blessed Crest.And the *best* part? They're apparently holding him in the one place Miklan had sworn never to set foot again: Sreng.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier, Miklan (Fire Emblem) & Felix Hugo Fraldarius, Miklan (Fire Emblem)/Original Female Character
Comments: 8
Kudos: 76





	Miklan and Felix Do Sreng

**Author's Note:**

> lord this is super self-indulgent, I hope y'all enjoy reading as much as I'm enjoying writing sci-fi bs jargon and worldbuilding

Miklan has a less than positive feeling about this delivery.

The buyer had no trouble paying, even dropped seventy-five percent up front with an _extra_ twenty-five to be tacked on for hand delivery. Not exactly unheard of with extremely rare cargo, but this isn't rare cargo, just a bit harder to find in bulk. The buyer wanted it _fast_ , though, so Miklan chalks it up to payment for his speed.

But now that he's docking and the buyer is coming to collect (because Miklan likes to get paid but he's not stupid, you don't meet a buyer face-to-face outside of an enviro _you_ control) Miklan is starting to feel that something is...off.

Itha Station isn't your usual seedy smuggler den, and that tracks with the buyer's credit, but it's also out of the way of usual lanes—too far into the system for a ground-floor handoff between a smuggler and buyer instead of a distribution ring of already delivered goods. It makes him think the cargo might not be getting the sort of use he would expect—bio-weave is versatile, most often used in hospitals or high-end armor, but with this much of the shit you could do anything from building a targeted bomb to starting a clone mold.

And it's too close to Fhirdiad, which makes his skin prickle. This could be a setup, but they could have gotten him on _much_ worse than bio-weave if that was the plan. Technically there are plenty of legal reasons to have bio-weave, it's just the _quantity_ that makes it odd.

There are plenty of legal channels to get the stuff, but not this much, this fast—hence Miklan.

Most damning, though, is that the buyer seems to know how Miklan operates, though it's the first time he's ever moved weight for them.

That makes him feel like this may be _personal_ , and there are plenty of people who would like to get personal with Miklan. His old raider crew, for starters, and some of their old raid victims, and a few other smugglers he's knocked over. ...His brother, maybe, although last Miklan saw or heard, he was doing quite well for himself, and he'd never been a _vengeful_ sort.

And least likely, a few people in the Sreng sector of the system.

Whatever way, whether it's personal or just some very picky and odd customer, Miklan waits in the cargo bay of his ship, leaning against the bulkhead beside the cases of bio-weave with a hand light and casual on his hip; his middle and ring fingers tap against his baton, folded away and hidden from sight but easily reached if shit seems to be going sideways.

The call comes in from his buyer, the code phrases are exchanged, and he opens his bay. He's not pleased, but not exactly surprised, when the figure who steps onto his ship isn't identifiable—dark navy layers over worn brown leathers in the chill of the docks, a hood pulled up to shadow the face, they would be nondescript and forgettable if their entire vibe didn't scream ' _danger_ '. Keeping your identity hidden makes sense when you are smuggling, but it also makes sense when you're carrying out a murder, and Miklan is less and less pleased by the second.

His instincts prove true when the bay door closes behind the buyer—you don't sell out in the open where just anyone can see—and in two quick strides the buyer advances with a drawn blade. Miklan had been ready, but the buyer is _fast_ , and he only manages to flick his baton open before he's pressed back with a blow to the center of his chest and a neuroblade to his throat.

While he catches his breath, his attacker disarms him, and then pulls back his hood to glare up all pale-faced and furious, Miklan's reflection caught like a bug in the amber of his eyes. Duke Felix Fraldarius, one of those people who would like to get personal, and Miklan knows he is well and truly fucked.

“I'm here for Sylvain,” Felix says, and his voice is steel and grit and the cold of a spacewalk. Miklan looks down at him and scoffs.

“Figures. I always thought if he decided to off me he'd do it himself, but why bother, right?” Those eyes narrow as the knife hovers close to his skin, the electric hum of the ultra-thin blade making the stubble on Miklan's throat prickle. After a moment, the Duke huffs in disgust and shoves away from him, flipping the knife in his hand to a hold better for stabbing than slashing.

“You really weren't involved, then.” He sounds disappointed, and Miklan takes another long look at him now that the Duke doesn't have him on the end of a blade.

The Fraldarius men always seemed small to Miklan, who had been a tall boy, and Felix had always been the smallest. Now he stands taller than Miklan remembers Glenn standing, and that pangs something, but it's an old and distant ache somewhere deep. He's built like a drift-pit fighter, all speed and wiry muscle, and Miklan knows he probably has at least five more knives hidden on his person along with the sword—a fucking _sword—_ at his hip.

His hair is longer than it was the last time he saw him in person, a ponytail almost like Glenn's, but without the unruly wave, and just barely threaded here and there with silver... anyways, he looks tired, deep bags and a shadow under his eyes. It doesn't detract from the glare Felix has on him.

“Involved in what?” he asks, settling back against the bulkhead, figuring if he's going to be stuck there he might as well get comfortable. Felix ignores his question to look at the containers stacked up the wall, strapped into place.

“This is the bio-weave?” he asks, and Miklan turns his head.

“As ordered.” He watches Felix counting the containers with a quick glance, a resigned inhale as he turns back to Miklan.

“Good. I'll transfer the rest of the payment.” This gives Miklan pause—why the fuck is _Felix Fraldarius_ bothering? Why hire _Miklan_? Why _pay_ him? The last time they saw each other, he was a kid looking at Miklan like he'd kill him with his own bare hands if given the chance. He's always been close to Sylvain, just as Miklan had once been close to—well, that doesn't matter.

Miklan doesn't voice his misgivings, he needs those credits, and once they're in the account it won't matter what Felix does with Miklan; they go straight on to Roisin anyways.

What's really getting to him is that he _knows_ there's more, and Felix doesn't disappoint.

“I'll double the entire payment,” he says, and Miklan is caught—that is a _lot_ of credits, which, _shit_ , would go a long way, but _also_ , it's _a lot of credits_. That means whatever Felix wants from him, Miklan already knows he's _not fucking interested_.

“No way,” he says, crossing his arms, and Felix just stares at him. “Whatever it is, I'm not interested.”

“I wasn't offering,” Felix says, unmoving. “Sylvain is...missing,” and Felix's face pinches over the word, like it's a creative joke, “and you're going to help me find him.”

“You hardly need _me_ to scour the sector's whorehouses,” he says, and the flash of fury on Felix's face would be very satisfying if the man wasn't still holding a neuroblade that he was extremely skilled at using. But the fury doesn't last long—Felix truly has changed over these years—and in it's place arrives contempt.

“Missing as in, abducted. I have an idea where he's been taken. I _need_ you,” and he looks disgusted to have to say such words, “because you know the back-routes and the system.”

Oh, _fuck_ no.

“ _Fuck_ no.”

“You owe him this.”

“I don't owe that brat _shit—_ “

Miklan does not expect the _laugh_. It's cutting and cold and so contemptuous it feels more like Felix punched him in the gut than cut him off with a laugh.

“You think you _don't owe Sylvain_? You think you've been running around the system breathing recyc'd air because you're just _that_ good of a smuggler? You think Sylvain hasn't stopped us any number of times over the years from getting rid of you? After the war, _during_ the war?” Felix shakes his head. “The only reason I haven't already killed you today for all the shit you did to him as kids is because I need your help to _find_ him.”

Fine. That's fair, Felix is right, Miklan won't lie and say he was ever an especially good brother. Bullying your spoiled younger brother to the point you nearly kill him doesn't win any Best Sibling Awards. Miklan won't even lie and say that he is an especially good _person_ ; but he has, since Miach, at least actively tried not to be a _worse_ one.

The grip of his hands around his crossed arms tightens in frustration, and his left ring-finger burns.

“I can't go back to Sreng,” he grits, and Felix scoffs.

“Still more worried about your own skin than—“

“It's not _my_ skin—“ Miklan starts, and then stops with a bitter noise, because it's not like Fraldarius gives a fuck about anyone _Miklan_ might want to protect. “Fine. Fuck it, you don't care, it's all about precious Sylvain, as usual. I'll sneak you into Sreng. But if I even _think_ my presence there is gonna get out? I'm gone. It's non-fucking-negotiable; threaten to kill me or actually do it, no difference to me.”

“Once we get to Sylvain, you can do whatever you want. Die, for all I care.” Miklan smirks at that.

“Speaking of dying, because this sounds like there's a high chance—I want your word as a _Faerghan_ that if I kick it doing this for you, you're still going to deposit that doubled payment.” It won't make up for him dying and not sending money at all anymore, but it will be a hell of a buffer for Roisin to work with. Felix's eyes narrow, but he finally sheathes the neuroblade and nods.

“You have my word, then—you help me to the best of your ability and I'll pay whether you die or not.”

And just like that, Miklan finds himself on a trip to sneak into fucking Sreng for his spoiled little brother.

+

It's disturbing how quickly and with how little fanfare Felix seems to take things over. Miklan figures it comes with the whole 'Duke' thing, the way Felix just silently directs him around his _own damn ship_ , but he gets the man settled in fairly quickly and then asks exactly _where_ the hell in the Sreng sector they're supposed to go.

Felix rests a hand on the hilt of his sword and Miklan tenses before he sees the man is looking towards the cargo bay with a far-off sort of expression, and he figures it must just be a habit to put his hand there. Fucking Fraldariuses, Glenn had been the same way—

“I need to get into the bio-weave. I'll be able to answer better after.”

So Miklan helps Felix undo the straps securing the cargo containers and pull one down—it’s easier than letting him do it himself and cleaning up all the containers when they inevitably spill across his cargo bay floor.

Felix drags the container further across the floor while Miklan secures the remainders, and by the time he’s done Felix has cracked it open and is pulling packs of bio-weave out, stacking them with a serious focus. Miklan watches, and Felix says nothing to him until he has a sizable stack. “I’m done with this for now,” he says, putting the lid back on the half-emptied container, and Miklan lifts an eyebrow and sweeps a sarcastic little bow.

Felix ignores it, busying himself opening a pack of bio-weave, and Miklan understands that Felix has grown in more than just height—his patience _and_ his pettiness have expanded.

He secures the container, and when he turns back he finds Felix seated in a circle made of bio-weave fibers and studded at intervals with small trinkets, crystals, and tokens. Felix is pulling off his gloves when Miklan realizes what’s going on.

“What the fuck are—you’re _not_ doing technomancy _on my ship_ —”

“Shut up, Gautier, I’m concentrating,” is the only answer he gets, and then Felix is sliding a tiny knife across the pad of his thumb and pressing his clenched fist to the circle of bio-weave. The circle lights with flickering blue electricity and Miklan takes two steps back—this shit is dangerous and _volatile_ , and it’s not the kind of thing a Fraldarius is made for, they have Crests for battle, not finicky biohacking like a Macuil.

He doesn’t dare interrupt now, can’t risk Felix fucking up and unleashing all of that collecting energy, whether its lethal or not—technomancy is illegal as hell on a station like Itha, where a hack gone wrong could cause a major explosion. Miklan can only watch in fascinated horror as Felix kneels in the circle, the growing light of the electricity casting him in blue light that warps his features into something harsh and bird-like. His lower lashes cast shadows on his open eyes, swishing back and forth over open air as though reading something, his mouth moving in soundless words.

Slowly, his face pinching with strain, Felix lifts his unbloodied hand and that blue light in the ring of bio-weave ebbs up out of the fibers and into his body, glowing out of his eyes and mouth like some kind of fucked up lantern before he snaps his fingers and it shoots up his arm like sparks to form an image above his hand. Miklan recognizes a standard sector map of Sreng, painted in holographic blue, with one pulsing spot of gold deep into the system, in the middle of fucking nowhere.

“See it?” Felix asks without looking at him, his voice ragged, and Miklan nods.

“I see it.” The image disappears and Felix presses both palms to the bio-weave; the light flows off of him, back into the fibers and fills the coils of synthetic nerve. Slowly he leans back, detaching himself from the energy-loop, and something in the circle pops and flickers, the bio-weave burning out to dissipate the energy.

“You couldn't have just pulled up a starmap?” Miklan asks, trying to mask how shaken he is with sarcasm, and Felix glares down at the faintly smoking ring of destroyed bio-weave—fuck, no _wonder_ he ordered cases of the shit, if he's going to do this again. How _many_ times is he planning on doing it?

“They've been moving him; I think they have him on a ship or a mobile station,” he says, slipping his gloves back on and collecting the objects he had placed on the circle, securing them in pockets hidden away in the layers of his clothing. “If his location was static, I wouldn't need _you_ to bring him home.”

Miklan is no practical expert on technomancy—his lack of a Crest meant no time was wasted on educating him—but he knows enough about the practice. Gautiers were soldiers, their special Crest lending itself to physical enhancement, but there were the rare ancestors who had been spellsmiths and biohackers. Miklan might have been a spellsmith himself, if he'd had the patience for it or a father who gave even a quarter of a damn.

But that was beside the point: technomancy.

It's difficult and dangerous and requires _strength_ and _patience_. It can go wrong easily if the user is unskilled or unfocused, and even when they aren't, it exacts a price. A price like, silver threads in inky-black, exhausted bags under copper eyes, a slight weary tremor in the hands.

It's not the sort of trick you pull out for small shit, is what he's saying. It's a big deal, a life or death deal, and Miklan reevaluates just what kind of relationship Felix Fraldarius has with his brother, that he's willing to risk himself that way to 'bring Sylvain home'.

Besides that, he knows enough to know _tracking_ requires connection—mental, sure, but _physical_ , _too._ Felix has to have a literal piece of Sylvain on him, something with DNA, and one of those things drilled into you when you came from a family with a Crest was to be wary of _who_ had access to something as precious as your coveted genetic code. Even Miklan, without a Crest, was trained to be wary of his blood, his hair, even shit like nail clippings where the DNA extracted was likely to be too contaminated for use. That's not even touching the _excruciating_ Talk he and Sylvain had received, where they had been warned to 'guard their seed from Crest Hunters'.

 _Anyways_.

It says something about the relationship if Felix is just waltzing around with a piece of Sylvain on his person.

“If I pull up a few maps, can you pinpoint where all he's been when you checked?” Miklan asks, instead of dwelling on the fact _his brother_ is probably fucking _Felix Fraldarius_ (Glenn would've had a fuckin' field day).

“Yes,” is the immediate answer, with an expectant look as if Miklan is meant to do that _right now_. Miklan gives Felix a pointed look of his own, glancing down at the burnt out ring of bio-weave, but Felix just stares. Figures, Miklan would swear stubbornness was more of a Fraldarius genetic trait than their Crest was.

“Fine. This way, Your Grace,” he says with a slightly mocking sweep of his hands, and Felix pushes himself up from the circle on the floor to follow him to the cockpit and his nav-panel. When Miklan pulls up a starmap of Sreng, prickles in his gut, Felix leans in over his shoulder and carefully begins placing markers. Four markers in, Miklan is pretty sure he knows what's up, but he waits until Felix finishes and leans away before he sighs and absently rubs the scar across his nose.

"Whoever they are, they're moving him along a smuggling route," he says, annoyed that already his actual expertise is proven to be needed, "and one of the smarter ones. It's the kind of route where the law is scarce, and when they do show up they're all too eager to look the other way for a bribe. Either your kidnappers are Sreng, or they have Sreng connections, because you've got to be in the scene for a bit to know about this route."

"Sreng connections, then," Felix mutters darkly, and Miklan leans back in his seat, swiveling to look Felix in the face.

"You have some idea who we're dealing with?"

Felix scowls. "They're a shadow organization, with ties to a multitude of unsavory things. Most relevant to Sylvain's abduction, though, would be their...medical experiments. Attempts at Crest replication and implantation, that sort of thing." Felix sniffs, arms crossed.

"This shadow organization have a name?" Miklan asks, because it's entirely possible he's worked with them before—he has worked with _all_ sorts in his time. Felix drums his fingers once along his bicep.

"I don't know the name they use for themselves, but the name they've been _given_ by pertinent authorities is Those Who Slither Behind The Stars."

"...That's fucking stupid."

"Yes, I agree."

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading! 
> 
> Find me on Twitter [@AceMorningStar](https://twitter.com/AceMorningStar)


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